As Russia asserted progress in its goal of seizing the entirety of contested eastern Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin tried to shake European resolve Saturday to punish his country with sanctions and to keep supplying weapons that have supported Ukraine's defence.
The Russian Defence Ministry said Lyman, the second small city to fall to Russia this week, had been "completely liberated" by a joint force of Russian soldiers and Kremlin-backed separatists, who have waged war for eight years in the industrial Donbas region bordering Russia.
But Russia's recent progress in Donetsk and Luhansk, the two provinces that make up the Donbas, could further embolden Putin. Since failing to occupy Kyiv, Ukraine's capital, Russia has set out to seize the last parts of the region not controlled by the separatists. The governor of Luhansk reported that Ukrainian fighters repelled an assault on Sievierodonetsk but Russian troops still pushed to encircle them. Speaking on Ukrainian TV later Saturday, Gov. Gov. Serhii Haidai said the Russians had seized a hotel on the outskirts of Sievierodonetsk.
Svetlana Lvova, the manager of two buildings in Bakhmut, tried to convince reluctant residents to leave but said she and her husband would not evacuate until their son, who was in Sieverodonetsk, returned home.On Saturday, people who managed to flee Lysychansk described intensified shelling, especially over the past week, that left them unable to leave basement bomb shelters at all.
Germany and France brokered a 2015 peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia that would have given a large degree of autonomy to Moscow-backed rebel regions in eastern Ukraine. However, the agreement stalled long before Russia's invasion in February. Any hope that Paris and Berlin would anchor a renewed peace agreement now appears unlikely with both Kyiv and Moscow taking uncompromising stands.
The press service of the Ukrainian Naval Forces said two Russian missile carriers "capable of carrying up to 16 missiles" were ready for action in the Black Sea. It said that only shipping routes which had been established through multilateral treaties could be considered safe.